When Soraya Naini Arjomand was ten years old, her family toured China, visiting among a number of places, an elementary school in Beijing. This was the first time she saw sustainability in full action at a school. “Attending classes with other students, I was amazed that there was near zero waste generated each day. Even at lunch, with everything from their school dishes, flatware, and placemats to how they prepared and served lunch to each student, nothing ended up in the garbage can. That experience stayed with me and helped me see the opportunity we have to be more sustainable,” she says.

Now a junior at Bellevue High School, Soraya advanced her interest in sustainability by becoming a Bellevue City Sustainability Ambassador through King County nonprofit Sustainability Ambassadors - an organization that empowers students, teachers, and community leaders to have sustainability impact. To this end, Soraya organized and collected high school student signatures supporting the Bellevue School District Board’s proposed first ever Sustainability Policy (Policy 6811), given it lacked the support of all board members and was at risk of not being passed. Sharing the student petitions collected, Soraya advocated for the policy at the School Board’s public meeting asking, “If our environment isn’t succeeding, how can we?”

Soraya also challenged the Bellevue School Board to lead on sustainability and to “be the trendsetter for other districts locally and nationwide.” The policy passed in April 2023. “Soraya’s initiative to establish strong student support for this policy was instrumental in energizing all board members to vote in favor of the policy,” shared Bellevue School District Superintendent Dr. Kelly Aramaki.

At the same time, during the school year Soraya has pursued her passion for ballet at the Pacific Northwest Ballet School (PNB), with spring and summer ballet dance intensives at the Royal Ballet School of London, the American Ballet Theatre, the Boston Ballet school and, most recently, NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. She recounts, “As dancers, we all go through many pointe shoes. One day, I looked at a large pile of old pointe shoes I had and thought I should do something with them rather than to keep throwing them away. I spent months experimenting, taking apart the shoes and working with the fabric. From this, I designed and created a product - a small pouch - that I thought dancers would appreciate and use.”

To carry this forward, Soraya created Planet Pointe (planetpointe.org), a nonprofit dedicated to bringing more sustainability to dance. “Given dancers go through pointe shoes quickly, through upcycling pointe shoes into usable items Planet Pointe today strives to increase eco-consciousness in the ballet community,” she enthuses. 

Starting this fall, Soraya has partnered with the Dancewear Center stores in Kirkland and Renton to launch her ballet pouches. Soraya’s current goal is to collect and upcycle 750 pointe shoes by January 2025. She adds, “By the time I'm a senior, my goal is to more than triple this number to over 2500 pointe shoes. To date, I have organized collection boxes at eight ballet retail stores and studios, collecting over 500 pointe shoes. I am so inspired and grateful for the support received from the entire dance community.”   

Soraya’s junior year will be filled with her studies, sustainability ambassadorship, Planet Pointe, and ballet training at PNB, where she attends their downtown Seattle studios six days a week. She is very hopeful for the future and is committed to inspiring others to be the same. Having won first place in the National Parent Teacher Association’s (National PTA) 2024 “I Am Hopeful Because. . .” Reflections’ essay and original dance choreography interpretation contest, Soraya used her National PTA winnings to fund Planet Pointe.

Sustainability will remain a priority for Soraya. “People much older than me may think sustainability should not be a priority because nothing we do today will likely impact them soon. But my generation will see the impact of everything that is or is not done today. Leading as role models is critical. I feel lucky to be able to play a small role and hope others will consider doing the same,” she says.

For now, Soraya is focused on Planet Pointe and hopes anyone who reads this will drop any used pointe shoes they may have at one of her many collection boxes and, if they have none to share, then minimally they will consider taking actions that bring even more sustainability to our communities (see Locations – Planet Pointe for dropoff locations). Though she will donate all money collected from selling ballet pouches to the Sustainability Ambassadors’ organization, more important to Soraya is how many more people engage and join the sustainability movement. 

In conclusion, Soraya says, “I would like people to know you can bring sustainability into any aspect of your life. Especially for the youth in our community, there are so many easy and creative opportunities to do so. You just have to decide you will.”